


Beneath Rain on a Strange Roof

by Elizabeth Culmer (edenfalling)



Series: Weregild [2]
Category: Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter - Laurell K. Hamilton, Inception (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Backstory, Crossover, Domestic, Family, Fluff, Gen, Necromancy, Prequel, Vampires, cotton candy bingo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-18
Updated: 2013-09-18
Packaged: 2017-12-26 22:40:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/971144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edenfalling/pseuds/Elizabeth%20Culmer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In happier times, Arthur babysits for Mal and Dom.  A tiny prequel to "Weregild."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beneath Rain on a Strange Roof

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is set in the same fusion AU as [Weregild](http://archiveofourown.org/works/219330/chapters/330127), but takes place in September 2006, five years before Arthur meets Ariadne in St. Louis. It's also a response to the [Cotton Candy Bingo](http://cottoncandy-bingo.dreamwidth.org/) prompt _babysitting_.

"You are a jewel, Arthur," Mal said as she wrapped a shawl around her shoulders, silk the color of a rain-filled dawn clinging like a scrap of lost cloud come down to earth. "A ruby beyond price. I only wish I could bring you as well, to introduce you to Lebrun and give you a better sense of our dance, but it would be impolitic to appear without Dom, and with Nash so unreliable these days I trust no one else to coordinate--"

"I know. The kids are safe with me," Arthur said, handing over the matching gloves. Mal pulled them on with careless haste, centuries of practice ensuring that her nails did not tear the fabric.

"Their safety was never in question," Mal said. "Your safety, however -- or perhaps the safety of your mind -- is a horse of another color. Are you quite sure you will be good on your own? I can call Miles and Marie if you wish some backup."

"We'll be fine," Arthur assured her. "Charm a hundred concessions out of Lebrun, and grab me some pizza on your way home."

"Vegetables only, yes?"

"Vegetables only." Arthur opened the door as Mal moved toward it, letting cool air and the sound of rain into the house. He tipped his head in the implication of a bow and gestured into the tenuous shadows of a city night. "My lady, your chariot and knight await."

"Ah, Arthur, _tu me fais toujours sourire_ ," Mal said, the delicate skin around her eyes crinkling in a nearly invisible smile. "And thank you again, a thousand times." She dropped a cool, fleeting kiss on his cheek and descended the front steps in a whirl of silk and perfume. Down on the street, Dom helped his wife into their Mercedes and grinned companionably up at Arthur while he closed his umbrella. The car started with a muted, expensive growl and cut into traffic like a shark slicing through a school of lesser fish and vanished into the rain-damp September night.

Arthur closed the door.

It was hard to believe he'd only been in Oakland for four months. Already he felt he'd known Mal and Dom for years, and they certainly acted as if the sentiment was reciprocal. To entrust him with the physical safety of their children was one thing. Anyone in Mal's court with a minimum amount of power could find himself or herself on guard detail. In fact, several were watching over the exterior of the house right now, ready to take care of minor disturbances and call Arthur if anything more complicated occurred. But to entrust him with keeping Philippa and James happy -- that, as Mal would say, was a horse of a different color.

Speaking of which...

"You can come out now," Arthur said as he turned the deadbolt.

Philippa stuck her head around the archway between the living room and the solarium (an odd room for a vampire, he'd always thought, but Mal was fond both of plants and of watching Dom lounge in late afternoon sunbeams), thumb tucked just between her lips where she could gnaw on it to best effect. "You always know where we are," she said. " _Maman_ and Daddy don't always remember to listen for our hearts, but you always know. Is it 'cause you're an animator?"

"Yes," Arthur told her, straight-faced. "All life is a blot on the peace of the grave. It burns like a thorn in my heart and I pray every night for a chance to kill you all. It's too bad for you that your parents aren't here to stop me from burying you alive."

Philippa raised her other hand to her mouth, pulling it wide to make a better frame when she stuck out her tongue and rolled her eyes. "You're so _weird_. That's not even a good joke -- it's just dumb."

"You always know when I'm joking," Arthur said. "How do you do that?"

"'Cause I pay attention!"

"So do I. That's how I know where you are," Arthur told her. "You too, James. Stop picking leaves off the plants; you know your mother doesn't like that."

In the solarium, James heaved a giant sigh. "I haveta?"

"Yes! You haveta, or else Arthur'll get mad and then he won't show us how to raise zombies," Philippa said, twisting to poke at something out of Arthur's sight.

"'kay." James wobbled into the doorway and tucked himself tight against his big sister's side, his short blond hair merging indistinguishably with the tail ends of her longer strands. "C'n we make the bunny now?" he asked.

Arthur picked up his bag of magic supplies from the mail table beside the front door, the same one he carried to all his contract raisings and which Mal and Dom had therefore never thought to question. He shook it slightly so the kids could hear his knife sheaths click against the heavy jar of ointment, and the live mouse squeak in its little cardboard box.

"You buried the rabbit in the backyard, right?" he said. Philippa nodded. Arthur smiled. "Normally we'd do this over the grave, but since it's raining, I'll dig up the body and bring it into the kitchen. We can put it in the sink to cut down on the mess."

Dom and Mal might object to him casually raising roadkill when they came home and heard the kids talk about blood and ritual circles, but there was no sense coddling children from hard truths. Death was a fact of life, all the more so for Philippa and James, who were inextricably involved in the preternatural world. The sooner they learned how to deal with it (and the attendant messes), the better.

Besides, he'd make sure they washed their hands before dinner. Germs were a fact of life, too, but there was no sense courting trouble and he was getting fond of the kids -- weird, when Arthur had never wanted any of his own, but Philippa and James had a way of sneaking into his heart. So did their parents. This wasn't the life he'd pictured when he left Minnesota and started picking up bounties, but the longer he stayed in Oakland with Mal and Dom, the less he wanted to leave.

If Mal still wanted him as her human servant after tonight, Arthur thought he would say yes.


End file.
